Too late for Tuesday Tunes

I woke up and thought, I'm wide awake, I'm not sleeping... and then I thought, wait, what song is that?

BAD - U2



~*~

... which of course, made me think of ...

I'm only sleeping - Beatles



~*~

And finally, when you sleep, you get...

Dreams - Allman Brothers Band



... which I might have posted here before?

That last song is so intense for me as I age, I can barely listen to it.

After so many years, it remains a masterpiece. Duane was amazing.

Yearly round-up: books, movies, etc

At left, DVD cover, George Harrison: Living in the Material World





I just loooooved Martin Scorsese's documentary about George Harrison, my favorite Beatle, incredible talent and just plain awesome individual. George introduced that old-time religion to the West, and for that, he got more karma points than you and I put together. The mind boggles.

I appreciated the film's emphasis on George's spiritual journey, which was given all proper and due respect; possibly for the first time I can recall. In most accounts, it's always been some variation of "ohhhhh there's goes dreamy George off with his Indian gurus again..."

What does it mean when someone has more money, fame, attention, sex, etc than most of us can contemplate in our wildest fantasies... and yet, still feels that something is missing? George's life is an enduring testament to spirituality-as-direct-experience, that I have always found very moving and intense.

"GEORGE!!!!!!!" -- screams, squeals; Daisy momentarily reverts to childhood.

~*~

After viewing the somewhat-interesting Another Earth, I watched the second movie from screenwriter-actress Brit Marling, titled The Sound of My Voice. Great premise, as with Another Earth... but my grandmother's phrase, too clever by half, comes to mind. The movie tries to have its cake and eat it too... the ending is something of a cheat, in my humble opinion... although very clever (too clever by half). Describing the movie further, is to jeopardize the story and the ending, although lots of people have.

Both of these indie movies are similar in that they are 1) weird, and 2) ponderous and thoughtful. But more than that, one gets the impression that everybody sat around brainstorming, figured out the boffo endings first and then WORKED BACKWARD. Both movies seem to work up to the 'surprise' endings, stacking the deck in ways that seem overly obvious in retrospect.

One of the strengths of truly surprising, beloved and inventive film-endings, is NOT stacking the deck, and hitting you upside the head all at once: BAM. Think: The Sixth Sense, Fight Club. You DID NOT see it coming, or only glimmers of it, and those delicious glimmers made you sufficiently curious to continue watching. In addition, these movies were not ALL ABOUT the endings, and in fact, people continue to talk about both movies without even referencing the endings. In short, you do not have to love the endings to enjoy both films, and plenty of people disliked the endings who nonetheless greatly enjoyed the movies as a whole.

I don't think that is possible for either Another Earth or The Sound of My Voice, in which one continues watching just to see their respective endings. The actual content of these movies tends to disappear into some kind of cinematic vortex, and the END is the whole thing. The tension is ratcheted up so high, one is watching just to get to the resolution of the grand puzzle; this viewer-disposition is likely due to the fact that they imagined the ending first, and worked backwards, filling in the blanks.

To briefly summarize, The Sound of My Voice is about a cult leader who claims to be from the future. Is she? Well? And you keep watching to find out. Do you actually find out? That is the pertinent question: I think it cheats and you don't, or do, or sorta-kinda both. Huh?

If this plot-line interests you, check it out. Apparently, this was originally planned as the first film in a trilogy, and I'd be lying to you if I said I wouldn't watch the sequels. In fact, the film makes sense as one of a trilogy, in the sense that it might not (in that case) be a total cheat, but I was still a little pissed. Excuse me, but that's 85 minutes I'd like to have back, if you are not going to answer the fucking question. Hmph! (And at this point, it is not clear that they will even be able to make the sequels.)

Hello, lovely Ms Marling and company, this is what SERIAL TELEVISION is for. Maybe you should go to HBO or somebody like that next time, instead of seeking all that attention at Sundance.

~*~

I was sufficiently blown away by Damien Echols' amazing prison memoir, "Life After Death", that I did most of a podcast about it. I certainly cannot do it justice. If I had to recommend one book for the year, this would be it.

How does one keep from losing one's mind and/or being eaten up with fury, while spending 18 years (half his life) on Arkansas's Death Row, for something you didn't do? Another deeply spiritual testimony. His repeated use of the word "magickal" (for those things that transcend everyday-life and take us elsewhere), is just perfect, and aptly conjures up that momentary experience for us. If not for the magickal, some of us would shrivel up and die... and Damien was forced to cultivate the magickal in small, seemingly-inconsequential things (correspondence and pencil-sketches) and almost-forgotten memories, such as old mud puddles and songs he hadn't heard in decades.

A lesser-soul would have been completely destroyed. Many men (and yes, they are men) are completely destroyed, and he tells us all about that, too.

An uncompromising, poetic, breathtaking account. Go read it. Now.

~*~

Ayn Rand and the World She Made was some great reading, providing us with a detailed year-by-year account of Rand's life. Biographer Anne Heller obviously admired Rand, and that gives us the kind of intensity an Objectivist would deliver. The sexual abuse of starry-eyed-young-acolyte turned self-esteem-theorist Nathaniel Branden, is offered here in bright primary colors, so all you fellow scandal-mongers take note. (PS: And who knew that the former Nathan Blumenthal changed his name to one that had Rand's name embedded within? The book is full of GREAT GOSSIPY DETAILS like that.)

I came away convinced that Rand was a lifelong amphetamine-addict, which explained many of the awful extremes in her personality, particularly her ongoing personal paranoia. The fact that she surrounded herself with idolizing sycophants means that nobody challenged this facet of her character; to challenge her was to be consigned to the outer darkness, and few of her Objectivist cult/crew dared to go there.

And therefore, like so many other famous people we can name, she just got worse.

The book succeeded in making me compassionate for Rand, both as an intelligent woman who was often not taken seriously and/or understood, and as a drug addict who did not realize what was happening to her.

This doesn't mean she wasn't a horrific and selfish person; she was. But now I understand why.

And speaking of karma, Rand has plenty to answer for. Her influence on our government and economy has been widespread and damaging, starting with her acolyte Alan Greenspan getting his bullshit ideas taken seriously (while Rand herself could not) and getting himself repeatedly hired and promoted as some kind of economic genius. You can easily clock the deep influence of Rand on the Republican Party, including the fact that one of her fanboys recently ran for Vice President.

If you are interested in a thoroughly fascinating individual, a cultural touchstone and influential life--check out the Heller biography. Of all the books I have read about Ayn Rand (several), this one is the most comprehensive, descriptive and fair.

~*~

Sybil Exposed: The Extraordinary Story Behind the Famous Multiple Personality Case by Debbie Nathan, is indeed extraordinary. If you are a baby-boomer who read the popular SYBIL by Flora Rheta Schreiber in the 70s (and it seems that everyone did) and/or watched the TV-movie starring Sally Field (ditto), THIS IS FOR YOU.

Nathan's investigative account is about the genesis of the book; the psychiatric fraud/fakery and therapeutic-abuse propagated for the sake of money (and goodness, it poured in like water!). One fascinating subplot includes the details of how various psychological 'syndromes' are popularized and then streak through the population like wildfire. (Remember how "multiple personality disorder" became all the rage, with respectable stories on "60 Minutes" and so on?) Hey, when there is big profit to be made, people always materialize to make it. When the student is ready, the teacher will appear... and we might add, when the disease is invented, the doctor/cure will likewise appear, right on cue. For a fee, of course.

I am often reticent to talk about my ongoing skepticism concerning various hip diagnoses going around: bipolar disorder, ADHD, ADD, Aspergers, and so forth and so on. Everybody is depressed all of a sudden. And I see commercials for drugs, drugs, drugs, and dollar-signs are all over them.

This book renewed my skepticism, and made me feel okay about it. Psychobabble and hip mental-states/Dx go through recognizable phases and turn into fads (especially if there is profit at stake)... and somehow (just like religion) psychology always manages to renew itself and stay above the fray it creates. These charlatans never have to answer for themselves, and thus, they never do.

This is one such amazing tale. Highly recommended.

~*~

Other good books I enjoyed this year--

[] We Are Anonymous: Inside the Hacker World of LulzSec, Anonymous, and the Global Cyber Insurgency by Parmy Olsen, was really wonderful. I picked it up and did not put it down; all deep-internet (as in DEEP SPACE) junkies will enjoy it immensely.

[] As Consciousness Is Harnessed to Flesh: Diaries 1964-1980 by Susan Sontag (which I first mentioned here) has continued to shape my thoughts, months later.

One incisive quote concerning the change-in-consciousness wrought by television (and of course, even more accurate in the internet-era), which I scribbled down:

As the images multiply, the capacity to respond diminishes.

Yes.

[] Inside Scientology by Janet Reitman, is well worth your time. Short version: it's even worse than you think it is.

[] Millennium People, one of the last books by my favorite author, JG Ballard, which has only recently been published in the USA. WE MISS YOU, JAMES GRAHAM BALLARD!. Another excellent, related volume is JG Ballard: Conversations edited by V Vale, which has also been quoted here on DEAD AIR, at some length.

I return to it at regular intervals, to keep my sanity.

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I am currently reading Teachings from the Medicine Buddha Retreat by Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche, which is some rather dense and heavy reading... the kind of density that makes you read and re-read the same few pages, until you are sure you get it. And even then, you probably won't get it.

This encyclical contains lots of what the Baptists would call vain repetitions. The litany-reading, rosary-reciting ex-Catholic in me grimaces at still more verbiage that I must repeat. (sigh) Seriously, is there NO END to it?

Then again, it got George Harrison through. He faced his death on his own terms, unafraid. And it got Damien Echols through 18 years in solitary confinement.

And who could ask for more?

Frank would have loved the Occupy movement

Frank on Friday really should be several hours long. Unfortunately, the only time they do that is during "pledge week"--which means I am one of the few people looking forward to WNCW's fund drives. PLAY MORE FRANK! Today, they played Sting and Zappa doing "Murder by Numbers" together in a live performance, simply sublime. Frank kept referring to him as "Mr Sting" which was funny and oh so Zappaesque.

We miss you, man!

~*~

As I said earlier this week, the Occupy movement is under attack. Governor Haley (insert boos, catcalls, thumbs down, other rude gestures) cleared out Occupy Columbia from the Statehouse lawn, claiming protesters were urinating in the bushes. I wish I could have added my urine to the place, to express my dislike of our state government, as well as solidarity with the urinating Occupiers. Nineteen arrests.

First Amendment? What's that?

We need a lawyer to make the case that urine is a form of political protest. If you can artistically dip crucifixes in urine, it seems to me, you can pee on Haley's place of employment and claim that's political.

Alas, this is South Carolina, and we don't have any left-wing political lawyers here.

More nationwide:

Occupiers take over Brooklyn Bridge (Atlantic Wire)

Occupy New Haven meets NY Occupiers on other side of bridge (New Haven Independent)

Occupy Wall Street projects giant 99% logo onto Verizon building (Think Progress) Can you hear us now?

Occupy flash mob in Atlanta Wells Fargo bank (Twitvid)

Occupy Dallas Evicted (KDAF)

Occupy Austin Evicted (Austin Statesman)

Occupy Seattle means business (MyNorthwest.com)

Occupy Chicago protest results in 46 arrests on major bridge (Raw Story)

FBI Director Ducks Questions On Occupy Movement During SF Talk (SF Appeal)

Tea Party and Occupiers find common ground in Memphis (NPR)

Your soundtrack for today's readings!


Revolution - The Beatles



~*~

My husband's home state, Georgia, is next up for the "Personhood for Zygotes" people. They lost Mississippi, but they haven't given up. Not by a long shot.

Hanging out on Twitter last night, I finally got a "pro life" reply to my question: If you make abortion illegal, where will you get the money to build all those new jails? If there have been (as they claim) 53 million murders since Roe v Wade, where will they send all of these murderers? That adds up to the populations of several major cities.

Here is the reply, which was retweeted to me:

Woman who have an abortion should be put to death as soon as guilty gavel cones down. #prochoice is murder.

Silly me, asking about prisons!

I guess I should start asking, where will you get the money in the current economy to pay all those executioners? Or will they outsource that work, like they do call centers?

Pretty honest reply, though. At least the agenda is right out there: we looooove babies, but we don't care about the women who give birth to them and would prefer to kill them off.

Make no mistake, that is the agenda. And at least one of them is honest enough to say so.

How about we settle this once and for all?

Which version is best?

Please make your decision on the merits of the performances only, and not the fact that Lennon/McCartney wrote the song. The song was written FOR the Stones, so it doesn't have that trademark "sweet" sound of the early Beatles. I prefer the Stones version! (gasp)

Of course, both versions are great, but one slightly edges out the other. Keith sounds like he is channeling Robert Johnson or somebody like that, but plugged in. AWESOME GUITAR NOISE!!!!

~*~

Beatles - I wanna be your man



Rolling Stones - I wanna be your man

If looks could kill, they probably will

Words cannot express how much I love this song...

I recently thought of the line used as today's blog post title, whilst considering the hopelessness of the current political climate... THEN I realized the song came out in 1980, when the Right took over the last time.

And by the way--it isn't "she is so funky-hey!" It's French, you uncultured louts!: Jeux sans frontières (games without frontiers)

From Wikipedia:

The song's title comes from a European game show, Jeux Sans Frontières, that featured teams competing for prizes while dressed in bizarre costumes. The British version of the show was called It's a Knockout, a phrase that also appears in the song. The teams represented towns and cities from each country, so the games had an inevitable element of nationalism. While some games were simple races, others allowed one team to obstruct another.

The lyrics are seen as a critique of nationalism and war, which the song portrays as essentially childish. The tag line of the song, "Games without frontiers, war without tears" is a comment on the sublimation of the rivalries within Europe, caused by centuries of war, in a meaningless game.

The name Lin Tai Yu, which appears in the song, belongs to a character from the classic Chinese novel Dream of the Red Chamber.

Chiang Ching, another name mentioned, refers either to the wife of Chairman Mao and a leader of the Cultural Revolution or to Chiang Ching-kuo, the son of Chiang Kai-shek, who was president of Taiwan at the time the song was written.

The end of the first verse refers to Hitler and Enrico Fermi: "Suki plays with Leo, Sacha plays with Brit; Adolf builds a bonfire, Enrico plays with it." Hitler started World War II in Europe, while Fermi's nuclear reactor enabled the nuclear weapons which ended the war in Japan. Additionally, Sacha is a Russian nickname for Alexandr, while Brit refers to Great Britain which allied with Russia during WWII.

The album version of the song includes the line "Whistling tunes we piss on the goons in the jungle" before the second chorus.[2] This was replaced for the single release with a more radio-friendly repeat of the line "Whistling tunes we're kissing baboons in the jungle" from the first chorus. The whistling is Gabriel along with producers Steve Lillywhite and Hugh Padgham.

The "piss on the goons" remark was also a criticism of European imperialism in Africa, so I was sorry to see it change for radio. (This version is intact, from the original album, not the single.)

Aside: I think it always sounds extremely cool and poetic when names of TV shows are in songs... I had no idea the line "It's a knockout" was the title of a TV show, and the song actually sounds far better if you DON'T know. Likewise, I was disappointed to learn "Meet the wife" was a TV show title, from the Beatles song "Good Morning" ("It's time for tea and meet the wife")--because it sounds fabulous and terribly poetic without knowing that!

Similarly, a young friend of mine didn't know the reference to "Beat the Clock" (50s game show) in Jackson Browne's "Boulevard" and liked the line better ("The kids in shock up and down the block/The folks are home playing beat the clock") without knowing, and was disappointed Browne didn't write the line himself.

~*~

Games Without Frontiers - Peter Gabriel

Odds and Sods: They don't call it lunacy for nothing!

Due to the strangeness surrounding me, I knew it was a full moon, way before I saw it. Sometimes, you just know.


~*~


And the USA careens onward, listing evermore to the right, approaching the fever pitch of November elections. If Obama is re-elected, I expect a partial suspension of government by newly-elected Tea Partiers. Newt Gingrich successfully pulled this nasty stunt in 1995 and you can expect a reprise.

What?--you say, alarmed, they can't do that! Daisy laughs ruefully. THEY can do any damn thing they want to. And the way things are presently going, I am girding my loins and preparing for the worst. (I just hope my generally-congenial personality means *I* am not locked up.)

Yesterday, once again, nearly rear-ended due to the bumper stickers. The guy who did it had an MIA bumper sticker... yes, it's a veritable WAR OF THE BUMPER STICKERS. But that's why I tend to worry about the arrival of fascism... sure looks that way to me.

Several of the guys I work with counseled me to buy a gun. Uh-huh, and I'm sure the MIA guy would also have one, and that is a good way for both of us to end up dead. (Then again, I might end up dead when one of them pushes my little car into oncoming traffic.)

Despite my resolve, I might have to scrub off the bumper stickers. Doncha love how these patriots only want constitutional rights (such as FREE SPEECH) for THEMSELVES and not for the rest of us?

Trying hard not to hate. Damn, that sounds so 70s, but I am really trying not to, and fiercely meditating on impermanence.

~*~

Although African-American women get more abortions than white women, abortion is still regarded as a "white women's issue"--why?

This salient question is what started Faith Pennick on the road to making her documentary SILENT CHOICES, about the silence of black women on the subject of abortion, even (especially?) their own... and the many reasons for this:

According to a 2009 report by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, nearly eight in 10 African Americans claim that religion is very important in their lives, compared with just over half of all U.S. adults. And while black churches have historically served as beacons of political activism in this country, most of them have remained mute on the issue of abortion. “Black churches are very left as far as their political views on certain issues,” Pennick notes, “but when it comes to something like abortion, there’s this weird sort of break, like a split personality.”

One of the most pervasive stereotypes attached to this issue, Pennick says, is the image of the black woman as sexually promiscuous. “If we talk about abortion,” says Pennick, “it might make people think we’re freaks who just love sex. Not that there’s anything wrong with loving sex, but we’re giving the racists ammunition to say, ‘See, look at those sluts.’ “

To illustrate how this stereotype continues to thrive in contemporary society, Pennick points to the discovery in 2008 that Bristol Palin—the 17-year-old, unwed daughter of the GOP’s vice-presidential candidate—was pregnant. “Somehow, for conservative whites, it reinforced their traditional family values because she kept the baby and got engaged,” Pennick says. “But if that had been Sasha or Malia Obama, if they had been 16 or 17 and had gotten pregnant, oh my, every conservative in this country would have been saying, ‘[The Obamas] have no family values, they’re horrible parents.’“

Yup.

Excerpt from SILENT CHOICES. (caution, may trigger, etc)

Interesting that my mother's (illegal) abortion was also "a shot"--but she wasn't hit in the stomach. As a result of the shot, my mother slept for three days during which she bled so profusely, my grandmother thought she was dying.

After that, the pregnancy was gone, but I am convinced the hormonal-overdose might have been a precursor to the breast cancer she developed later.

It was her family doctor; he told her he did it all the time, but you had to "catch it early"...

~*~

RADISHES AND RICOTTA (unabashedly stolen from REAL SIMPLE):

1 cup fresh ricotta in small bowl
Drizzle with 1 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
Sprinkle w/1/8 to 1/4 tsp each, kosher salt and plain black pepper
Serve with two bunches of trimmed radishes.

Excellent source of magnesium, potassium, Vitamin B6, and alla that good stuff! YUM!

~*~

Botox is bad, which of course, you already know. But not only because you are injecting botulism toxin into your body (((screams for emphasis))) but because of the results. Facial expressions are not simply facial expressions.

The University of Wisconsin is on the case:

[Researcher David] Havas was studying people after a pinpoint treatment to paralyze a single pair of "corrugator" muscles, which cause brow-wrinkling frowns.

To test how blocking a frown might affect comprehension of language related to emotions, Havas asked the patients to read written statements, before and then two weeks after the Botox treatment. The statements were angry ("The pushy telemarketer won't let you return to your dinner"), sad ("You open your e-mail in-box on your birthday to find no new e-mails") or happy ("The water park is refreshing on the hot summer day.").

Havas gauged the ability to understand these sentences according to how quickly the subject pressed a button to indicate they had finished reading it. "We periodically checked that the readers were understanding the sentences, not just pressing the button," says Havas.

The results showed no change in the time needed to understand the happy sentences. But after Botox treatment, the subjects took more time to read the angry and sad sentences. Although the time difference was small, it was significant, he adds. Moreover, the changes in reading time couldn't be attributed to changes in participants' mood.

In sales work, I often gauge customer satisfaction by facial expression, and have long noticed that the Botoxed crowd is unable to let you know whether they like something or not. They may even WANT to let you know, but have rendered themselves incapable of doing so. I find it disorienting, and I tend to go emotionless in response. (Thus, I foresee a future in which all interactions between older women will be reduced to Stepford Wife/android-conversations.)

Uppity women are now controlled with pharmaceutical drugs and with the law; through advertising and through our reproductive capacities, and now, they can control our emotions, as I wrote three years ago. Women appearing unhappy or pissed off will probably be outlawed when the Tea Party takeover is complete, and the Botox injections will be mandatory.

Michele Bachmann's doctor will be rich, rich, rich! (Okay, I know, that was nasty.)

~*~

I used to read Adrienne von Speyr, when I was in my hard-core, pseudo-Opus Dei period. And I admit, I still like her! If anyone needs some female-authored (and surprisingly woman-centered) Catholic mysticism, check her out.

She once wrote: Anyone who knows the fullness of the light should not live in the twilight for the sake of thrift.

And I've always tried to live by that.

~*~

Closing with some random tunes I posted on Facebook, and some I've just been listening to in my car... starting with my favorite local band! :)

I'm a Country Man - Mac Arnold and Plate Full O Blues



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All I've got to do - The Beatles



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Easy To Be Hard - Three Dog Night



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This is special for Mr Daisy! (kisses)

Peggy-O - New Riders of the Purple Sage



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Big finish! Whenever I hear this song, I always wonder where all the Quaaludes went, LOL. In Ohio, we called em Sopors, while in the UK (and sometimes on the East Coast), the term was Mandrax. This meant: If you hitchhiked or otherwise traveled a lot, you might not know what you were being offered as you left one region for another, so it was important to be informed!

Ah, pharmaceutical nostalgia for all the former lude-heads in my readership! (goes with the whole FULL MOON motif)

Cities on Flame with Rock and Roll - Blue Oyster Cult

Faces shine, real low mind

Here's what I am listening to today. Join in, if you're of a mind to!

Hopefully, these will last. But YouTube is so busy removing videos, they could possibly be extinct by later in the week. If they are, I apologize in advance.

...

Okay, who among you knew that the Hill Street Blues TV-theme was written by Larry Carlton, the session musician who delivers the killer-guitar work in Don't Take Me Alive? (What did we ever do without Wikipedia?) And despite what you hear, it is "Bookkeeper's son," not "Poolkeeper's son." (Decades of arguments, once again, finally settled by the internet!)

I looooove this song, decided I would play it since it's about blowing people up and therefore sorta fits in with the whole morbidity/responsibility theme of this past week.

Here in this darkness
I know what I've done
I know all at once who I am


Don't Take Me Alive - Steely Dan



~*~

This incredible song has multiple chord/tempo/melody changes, zoom de zoom, zippity do dah, all in ... two minutes. Two. Minutes.

How the hell did they do this in two minutes?

This is, one presumes, how they got to be The Beatles.

Wait - The Beatles



~*~

This might be the greatest thing I ever heard, and 40 years later, let's hear the band that can sound this good!

Iggy 4-ever, as I used to write on the cover of my loose-leaf binders... my heart still jumps at the sound of the first few bars, and those bizarre noises he is making. :) (RIP Ron Asheton)

Down on the Street - The Stooges (w/Iggy Pop)



~*~

I discovered through my endless snooping that my 2nd husband is on his parish's prayer list. I confess, I would like to know why. Am I worried? Well, yes, no, maybe. You know the tangle of emotions you have when you discover something online about an ex, and up bubbles all that guilt, anger, remorse, all those juicy feelings.

Do I hope he's okay? Well, no.

Do I want him to suffer? Well, no.

You can see the dilemma, then.

(Not sure what I think of the video; first time I've ever seen it. Does beating a black man at billiards automatically make George "bad"--or is it the attitude?)

Bad to the Bone - George Thorogood and the Destroyers



~*~

Classic country time--with even more astounding Wikipedia revelations: Jessi Colter was married to Duane Eddy before she was married to Waylon Jennings! I had NO IDEA!

A shot of Waylon gets deposited at the end of this video, although I always thought his eyes were brown. Aren't they? (So, who exactly was she looking for?)

I have guilt over not including Jessi in my Diva round-up in June.

I'm Looking for Blue Eyes - Jessi Colter



~*~

And so, I now include Jessi's husbands out of respect. (I should have included Duane in my Instrumental Oldies post, but will try to catch him on part 2.)

Detour - Duane Eddy



~*~

Jessi heard Waylon's golden pipes and just went OOOOOOOooooooOOOOOHHHHHHHhhhh....at least I assume it was like that.

Blue eyes ain't nothing on a voice like this. :)

Dreaming my Dreams - Waylon Jennings

Me and Columbine

It's very hard to write about things that are so personal--the mere scratching of the itch to discuss them, tears huge pieces off my hide.

So, I speak in a roundabout way, and hope you will all forgive me for being so imprecise with the details. I invite you to read between the lines. At this point, my vivid, emotional memories overlap another person's very intense memories, and her account of these events will be radically different. (How to honor both of our accounts? Is it possible?)

I remember the date of Columbine very well, because it was on the second anniversary of Columbine, that my own teenage daughter ran away from home. (It was 2001, the year so much else happened to rock our universe.)

And already, she would phrase it differently. She would say she didn't "run away"--she needed space, she needed a breather from her parents; she needed to be somewhere else for awhile, blah blah blah. But of course, the disconcerting fact is that she decided this for herself, for the first time in her life. It was a decision that did not include us, the people who had been making all of her decisions up until that point. It was her decision as a separate, sentient human being. An adult decision, by one not yet legally an adult, but physically an adult, who will do as she pleases. As I did. As we all did, at some point, unless we were exceptionally-obedient teenagers, and I certainly was not.

In my child, I deliberately inculcated the desire to question, to think, to consider the deeper concepts and major ideas... and then I was furious when I was the first person she questioned, that she applied these values I taught her to ME, the one who taught them.

Of course, that is always how it is.

But my sense of failure as a mother, my feeling of abandonment, was overwhelming, all-encompassing, smothering and seriously disabling. I lost friends. I took anti-depressants for several weeks and then stopped. I starved myself intermittently. I also lost a job during this extended debacle. I lapsed into almost-delirious magical thinking. I began friendships with people who claimed to have seen the Blessed Mother in person; I venerated relics of saints, and had novenas going to virtually every saint in Butler's, even the obscure saints of the Middle Ages that nobody ever heard of. (The magical thinking wears ever on, as I remain extremely fond of the saints I believe listened and responded; I never lost this deep attachment to saints that I formed during this critical time. Without them, I believe I might have gone stark-raving insane.)

And I thought about those other parents. The parents of Eric and Dylan.

Why didn't they know?--the accusatory questions for the Harrises and the Klebolds came fast and furious, and have never really abated. The contempt for these "clueless" parents was legion.

And so: The two-year-anniversary of Columbine was under discussion and the yearly parental inquisition and finger-pointing was under way on Fox News, exactly when I got the phone call that would change my life, alter my thinking, forever making me unwillingly sympathetic with the bad parents of the world.

In a daze, I saw the TV, seeing but not really seeing. Eric and Dylan. Thus, their photos will always mean something very personal to me, but probably not what they mean to you.

They represent that which we have brought into this world, but can no longer control. "Your children are not your children, they are the sons and daughters of life's longing for itself," wrote Kahlil Gibran. They will do what they think is necessary. Not what we think is necessary.

If we have taught them to think for themselves, they will come to different conclusions. It has been ever thus.

And they do. They will. They may decided to run away from home, or they may decide to shoot up a school. But that is nothing we wanted for them.

That is not our fault.

I crossed a line, that day. I was one of the parents who cried, who shakes their head, who doesn't understand what has happened. I was the woman in the Beatles song "She's leaving home"--I just plain didn't get it. Because it was another person's decision, what she should do with her life. It was not mine.

It was not the decision of the Harrises and the Klebolds, either. They did not make the decision that day. Eric and Dylan did. And that day, eight years ago, while the anniversaries played out on TV, my heart inexplicably pounded, as I knew I could never, ever judge their parents. Not now. Not ever again.

On the two-year anniversary of the Columbine massacre, I wept for the dead and injured of Columbine... and even more, even though I did not want to, I wept for the parents of the boys who went their own way. Who decided on their own, what they would do. The boys who did not stop to ask what mom and dad would think; and would not have cared anyway. The parents left holding the bag, shaking their heads, not understanding.

~*~

My family situation, over eight years, has worked itself out. There were several years that it looked dicey, but maturity and intelligence eventually manifested in my daughter's life, as she began to make the right decisions. Unfortunately, this cannot happen in Eric and Dylan's lives, which they decided to cut short. Their parents' suffering is ongoing, it will not pass, as mine has.

And on the ten-year anniversary, a few days ago, I wept again.

I pray always for those people forgotten in the carnage, the people who are hated and reviled for bringing these two lost souls into the world. I will pray for you always, Wayne Harris, Katherine Ann Poole, Thomas Klebold, Susan Yassenoff and the unique and unending pain you have endured. That day, I felt the connection with you, and I felt your consciousness merge with my own, as clearly as if you were standing right in my own kitchen.

And I am so, so sorry.

~*~

She's Leaving Home - The Beatles


~*~

Gone, when you wake in the morning
Gone, when you find that there's no one sleeping
Gone, pretty Penny was her name
She was loved and we all will miss her

Pretty Penny - Stone Temple Pilots

What I feel, I can't say, but my love is there for you anytime of day...

The Greatest Beatle of them all. From Dark Horse: The Life And Art Of George Harrison by Geoffrey Giuliano.



I think I first realized it when reading Dark Horse, the biography of my favorite Beatle. The quiet one, the spiritual one.

And on an internet message board some time ago, during the time I was reading the book, someone announced (yes, you know the drill) Christianity Uber Alles and as proof, offered the pop-culture "facts" that the Beatles and Elvis were Christian, at least until John met that awful woman. [1] I wasted no time in jumping on it: Excuse me, but George was no Christian! HANDS OFF GEORGE.

The response: Show me where George officially converted!

And of course, I could have Googled my little heart out and not found a thing... Hinduism is not like Christianity. They do not dip you in water and then announce you are one of them. They just don't do it like that. George spent considerable time in India; learned to play their holy instruments; did whatever various gurus told him to do; financed English translations of the Bhagavad Gita and named his son Dhani. Isn't that enough for you?

No, not for this guy. And I suddenly realized that our world has been MARKED by the presence of the two major religions, Islam and Christianity, the religions that commanded their followers to make believers of all nations.

The Majors, in competition with each other, have very precise rituals for conversion. It starts with an altar call, the announcement: I am a Christian, I am a Muslim. It's on the record. And then, more rituals, classes, education. In Christianity, baptism, and in Catholicism, Lutheranism, Orthodoxy, there is also Confirmation, known as Receiving the Holy Spirit. All of these rituals leave a mark on the convert, as they do on those raised in the faith: you have crossed over. You have been accepted into a tribe; you are one of us.

On Easter, lots of new folks come into the Catholic Church; it's one of the main draws of the long Easter Vigil Mass, in fact... we can watch the faces of the people as they are baptized: some are so pensive and introspective and some are in tears of ecstasy. Some are looking at wives, husbands, moms and dads: I hope this pleases you, because this is embarrassing. The variety of faces reflect all manner of religious experience. I always pick the faces that look happiest, and afterwards, I welcome them personally into the Church. Thus, I am also part of the ritual, if I choose to be.

Other religions do not do this. Therefore, being the Majors, we can judge the conversion not to have really happened. We apply our standards, our measuring sticks, and then find them lacking. Where is the baptism? Did you ANNOUNCE yourself somewhere? Where are the official records?

They don't do it that way. WE do it that way.

Unfortunately, the lack of officialdom, like a lack of borders, can lead to trouble and weirdness. It can lead to appropriation.

And yes, I realize that Islam and Christianity, as The Majors, are appropriated all the time. Rather than see Christmas as Christianity encroaching on secularism, for instance, I tend to see it as the secular world stealing our cool shit. (Hey, Santa Claus was St Nicholas of Myra, goddammit, leave him alone.) When you have all classes of rock bands singing SILENT NIGHT, all you can do is shake your head in amazement. But when you are one of The Majors, you can endure that. In fact, it is just more proof of how BIG you really are. They have Santa Claus in Japanese store windows, now, take that! (Are we #1 or what?)

In the end, Christmas trees and bad carols notwithstanding, the question, the BORDERS, stay constant: ARE YOU A CHRISTIAN? There is only one answer to that. You can modify it any number of ways (and Lord knows, I love my modifiers), but in the end, there is only one answer. There is a BORDER, and there it is: Yes or no?

Again, other religions may not have the brightly-drawn borders; the yesses and nos are not in stark relief.

That means, the stealing is not as well-understood. How can it be stealing if they are giving it away? They do not do it like we do, after all... they don't have a ritual demarcating one's entrance. You can enter and exit at will, any time you want.

And so, people do.

~*~

Daniel Pinchbeck, photo from Sounds True.




All of this came to mind as I read Reality Sandwich, new to my blogroll. I've heard Daniel Pinchbeck's CDs regarding 2012, much of which is also in his book, 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl. My first thought, after so much discussion and teeth-gnashing throughout Feminist/Lefty Blogdonia: Should he be doing that? Does the shamanic tradition properly belong to him? Is he stealing?

Much of Pinchbeck's work is about psychedelics and spirituality, which we could rightly claim is the recorded tradition of another tribe altogether, a tribe with a recognized pedigree, in which he does belong: hippies. (Pinchbeck's mother was Joyce Johnson, paramour of Jack Kerouac.) But there is a particular way that hippies approached enlightenment, and that is not necessarily the way Native Americans did, even if the mescalito is the same.

From the blurb on Pinchbeck's recent CD, titled Emergence 2012: The Soundtrack for Global Evolution:

Take a musical journey into the lush soundscapes of the 2012 phenomenon with Emergence 2012. Inspired by Baktuns—or cycles of the classical Mayan calendar—this mind-bending music infuses psychoacoustic rhythms with the chants of ayahuasca shamans and natural harmonics found deep within the forests of South America. Created by sound healing visionary Alex Theory and Daniel Pinchbeck, bestselling author of 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl.

And now we come full circle, to that place where hippies encroached on Native American religion, as well as Eastern religions.

Or did they?

What if they feel they were directly asked by [fill in words for God here]? What if, in fact, this is The Truth? Does the religious activity still qualify as "encroachment"--or is this the end result of an exhaustive spiritual journey? Is it cultural appropriation and imperialism if one BELIEVES THEY HAVE FOUND THE TRUTH?

I don't think it is.

This is not appropriation, any more than learning another language is. I think it is endorsing another spiritual truth. It is LEAVING The Majors, for something one finds more suitable and real.

But I'll be honest: I get unaccountably nervous when I hear hippies employing ancient chants that were never theirs.

And then AGAIN: If white hippies with education and privilege announce that something is genuine and true, isn't that something of a revolutionary endorsement? This is the real thing, not what I was taught by my own culture--is a pretty powerful statement. (Maybe THE most powerful statement.)

Where does appropriation start, when we talk about religions? Because they are not simply cultural, they are accounts of life, creation, consciousness, truth and morality. They are VERSIONS of how we approach the divine.

Can we rightly say this is stolen, when it is being endorsed as the Truth, above and beyond The Majors?

What do you think?

~*~


[1] If you haven't read Cara's fabulous several-part series on racism, sexism and Yoko Ono, go over there RIGHT NOW and read the WHOLE THING. Great analysis.

[2] The title of this post is from the first lines of my favorite George Harrison song, What is Life? (And yes, I realize it was produced by Phil Spector, subject of much fulminating here at DEAD AIR.) Embedding has been disabled, she sighed once again...

The song was also employed to excellent advantage in the DEAD AIR favorite GOODFELLAS, which I also intend to blog about one of these days.

Any major dude will tell you

I missed John Lennon's birthday, which was yesterday, October 9th (1940). He always told everyone (accurately) that he was born during the London Blitz.

I love this song, written mostly by John, but sung by George Harrison--assigned to give him confidence, so the story goes. (John sounded just like a boss!) This clip is from the film A HARD DAY'S NIGHT (1964). The song was written specifically for the movie AND for George. They all look beautiful!

Beatles - I'm Happy Just to Dance with You



~*~

Check out Donald Fagen's presidential endorsement!

And then, enjoy his band's old song:

Steely Dan - Any Major Dude Will Tell You

[via FoxyTunes / Steely Dan]

Dragon*Con 2008

Just returned from Dragon*Con in Atlanta, and hope you all enjoy my ultra-geeky photo gallery.

I posted a parcel of "Women of Dragon*Con" photos at Feministe. Thus, the following photos are rather male-centered, for which I apologize! (But go over and check those out too!)

Below:

1) The Imperial Stormtroopers took up the whole city block in front of the Hyatt.

2) Michael Hogan of Battlestar Galactica. I also attended the BSG panel, which included Edward James Olmos and James Callis. Other famous, ex-famous or pseudo-famous people in attendance at Dragon*Con this year included Micky Dolenz (of the Monkees), Adam West, Nathan Fillion, George Takei, Lou Ferrigno, Linda Blair, and Mr Daisy washed his hands in the restroom right next to Walter Koenig!

3) Bumblebee, a transformer.

4) Imperial Stormtrooper vs. Elvis

5) Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, in the parade on Saturday.

6) Obviously, one of the 300.

7) Furries in the parade, naturally leading to --

8) Furry Captain America!

9) Guy balancing a sword on his head, also in the parade. Yes, a real sword (possibly blunted, if he had any sense) and he did it for blocks!

10) The Vision and partner (name escapes me)

11) Republicans for Voldemort were campaigning at the Con, of course! HAHAHA!

12) through 15) Assorted geekery...I dunno these characters names but I liked the costumes.

~*~

Everybody's got something to hide except for me and my monkey

Dead Air Church: Tomorrow Never Knows

Welcome to all you intrepid explorers of the psyche, you mad adventurers of the gray matter, out there on Facebook and an unnamed message board, currently musing over my Dr Hofmann post. YES, this week, Dead Air Church is for you, you stratosphere-hopping maniacs!

Today, we feature Tomorrow Never Knows, the last song on the Beatles' influential Revolver. I was momentarily concerned that I had used a John Lennon song for Dead Air Church only a couple of weeks ago. And then I thought, wait a minute, regular churches uses the same prophets and mystics over and over again. I guess I can do the same here. I found a wonderfully appropriate psychedelic version.

Wikipedia gives us the background, as if you couldn't tell by just listening:

John Lennon wrote the song in January 1966, closely adapted from the book The Psychedelic Experience by Timothy Leary, Richard Alpert and Ralph Metzner, which they based on, and quoted from, the Tibetan Book of the Dead, with the understanding that the "ego death" experienced under the influence of LSD and other psychedelic drugs is essentially similar to the dying process and requires similar guidance.

Peter Brown claimed that Lennon's only source of inspiration for the song came from the Tibetan Book of the Dead, which it says Lennon read whilst tripping on LSD. George Harrison later stated that the idea for the lyrics came from Leary, Alpert, and Metzner's book. McCartney confirmed this by stating that he and Lennon once visited the newly opened Indica bookshop—as Lennon was looking for a copy of The Portable Nietzsche—and Lennon found a copy of The Psychedelic Experience, which quoted the lines: "When in doubt, relax, turn off your mind, float downstream". Lennon bought the book, went home, took LSD, and followed the instructions exactly as stated in the book.

That you may see the meaning of within: It is being.

~*~

The Beatles - Tomorrow Never Knows

[via FoxyTunes / The Beatles]

Odds and Sods - Azaleas and Beatles

Left: Azaleas! Photo from my hike in Falls Park (Greenville, SC) last weekend.

~*~

I've been entrusted to get the oil changed in Mr Daisy's car, but can't seem to rouse myself to do anything but putter around and look at Vanessa's cat drink out of the toilet. Lots of overwork lately, with attendant exhaustion. Where's my Rhodiola? I need an IV administered.

Whilst sifting through a mountain of ancient, illegally-recorded videotapes, I discovered A HARD DAYS NIGHT ("My grandfather? I thought he was your grandfather!"). And that reminded me: I need to stop and pick up Pattie Boyd's book, because clearly, there isn't enough trashy gossip in my life. I was talking about the book with a friend recently, who proclaimed it a must-read.

Apparently, the UK edition is titled Wonderful Today, which is perfectly fine, but in the USA, it was changed to Wonderful Tonight, in case we didn't know which famous fellas she was attached to. ((rolls eyes))

Quote from Times review:

In “Wonderful Tonight,” Boyd seems like a real person who happened to be lucky enough to live shoulder to shoulder with rock deities. The prose is clear and unpretentious, and although she writes candidly about the pain her husbands’ infidelities caused her — particularly [George] Harrison’s affair with Ringo Starr’s first wife, Maureen — this isn’t a bitter tell-all screed. There’s an aura of sweetness around Boyd’s approach. Her early years with Harrison, who comes off as a relatively gentle man, clearly were happy ones, and she rather openly states that she regrets leaving him — although she’s quick to acknowledge she would have regretted missing out on the passion she felt for [Eric] Clapton.

GEORGE AND MAUREEN! I MUST KNOW MORE!!!

~*~

I know I am pretty delinquent in my coverage of the Pennsylvania primary, which I knew Hillary would win, anyway. I am getting plenty depressed as the media and the electorate wallow in blatant racism and sexism, then self-righteously yammer that "The candidates should just focus on the issues!"

Hey! In case yall haven't noticed, those ARE the issues!

~*~

Speaking of George, this was the first song he ever wrote to appear on a Beatles album, and is also prominently featured in the aforementioned A HARD DAY'S NIGHT. George and Ringo called themselves "the economy-class Beatles"--usually George was rationed at two songs per album, max. (John and Paul were very territorial in the songwriting department.)

Not sure who he was talking about in the song. He was somewhat shy and introspective (especially compared to the other three) and was likely referring to various hangers-on, groupies and weirdos coming out of the woodwork after the Beatles became mega-famous. Certainly, he wasn't talking about our beloved Pattie!

Enjoy this little-known Beatles tune, which I've loved since I was about six years old. Feminists will appreciate that lots of us little girls sang it to boys who bothered us (in unison, too!) and we also jumped rope to it. (People who wonder why Pete Best got canned, just listen to that BEAT. The name was Beatles for a reason, people!)

The Beatles - Don't Bother Me

[via FoxyTunes / The Beatles]

Happy Valentine's Day!

No video, just audio. But you don't need video.

Must be played very, very loud, for maximum benefit. Yes, all 7 1/2 minutes! (It's orgasmic, it SUPPOSED TO BE long, okay?)

And speaking of which... enjoy your evening, everyone! :)

~*~

I Want You (She's So Heavy) - The Beatles

[via FoxyTunes / The Beatles]